GL95

It’s a bit weird because they SORAS kids all the time where the original actor is still on the show or just ignore actors’ ages if they play older. Rick had two actresses around his age play up in years who worked closely with him in Toby’s Amanda and SS’s Blake (SS being 23 when she left the show blows my mind-even with Rick, SS’s Blake just seems so much older but ironically they started styling her younger late in her tenure I think to play up the Ross age gap). I feel like a late 30s actress with some gravitas could pretty easily pass as Rick/AM’s mom in soap world in the early 90s.

It’s always sort of crazy that the 20-something generation on the show at that point had parents who were so bad that Buzz raising Lucy as a homeless grifter always on the run is seen as the height of fraternal stability. Half the “fun” stories she tells are objectively horrifying, especially when you consider that Buzz is not uniting her with his other family mostly out of cowardice.

Lucy’s mom bailed at some point when Lucy was really young, so Lucy didn’t ever know her. Nadine pretty early on became something of a surrogate mom to Lucy. I for the first time have been watching the pre-ditzy diner owner version of Nadine and Nadine/Harley, and Nadine taking in Lucy pretty fast makes a bit more sense because she gets that ideal image of a mother/daughter relationship without all the baggage of an actual mother/daughter relationship. Though it’s funny when Nadine first sees a picture of Lucy before she comes to town, Buzz tells her it’s the daughter a of a war buddy he’d raised. Then when Lucy shows up, Nadine is actually pretty horrible to her telling her that Buzz has already done enough for her and he’s not her real father even if she thinks of him that way. Since at this point Nadine wants Buzz back, she changes her tune instantly when she finds out Lucy is Buzz’s biological daughter. They never show Lucy being particularly curious about her mom, though she and A-M are a bit of a matched set on not speaking about their moms. Watching starting in 1990 with how many times A-M is in peril and Hope never once coming is pretty wild. Exploring their relationship is such a lost opportunity because A-M’s dark side is always blamed on the Spaulding side of him, but being the son of a single mom alcoholic in and out of rehab likely contributed to that drive to be noticed/instinct to manipulate. Is it implied Mike was active in Hope’s offscreen life/A-M’s childhood?

They both were out alone and got drunk together the night Blake locked Amanda in the construction site trailer but snuck out then returned only to give herself hypothermia.

If you match that up with A-M being 18 in 1987 then A-M is only three years older than Lucy which makes no sense to the story. Soap math does make the head hurt. (It’s also objectively a hilarious thing to get fixated on when it comes to suspension of disbelief on soaps.) So, bottom line Lucy’s mom could be anyone as far as the timeline goes since the internal timeline makes no sense.

What’s funny is I had no idea until I came on this board that Amanda wasn’t supposed to be in her 30s when she was reintroduced given the backstory with Ross. I just assumed she was supposed to be older than Blake. Similar to Sherry Stringfield’s Blake Toby Poser’s Amanda played older to me. (Side note I was stunned to find out Rick Hearst is a year older than SS.)

Dylan’s supposed to older than Harley? It’s sort of crazy that Dylan is with high schoolers up through 1993 roughly.

Harley is also the only one who made a good choice in adoption agency as far as the adoptive parent situation goes. Dylan/Dinah both had terrible childhoods. Alex not remembering she had twins and Nick subsequently being sold by her ex might win on crazy retcons.

Harley should be roughly A-M’s age but that doesn’t really make sense with Buzz disappearing after he’s drafted if we’re talking A-M’s onscreen birthdate. The A-M SORAS really messes with any timeline of anyone on the canvas. A-M would be born around 1970 to match his 18 years old in 1987. Lucy was 20 in 1993 so if they tried to have their adult ages match up Buzz would’ve been with Lucy’s mom roughly 1976 if my (very rough) math is right.

I started my current viewing on Rick Hearst’s first day in June 1990 when A-M gets rescued from being kidnapped/tortured. I didn’t watch him getting scammed into the marriage but they have him come from this ordeal laying it on thick how the only thing that got him through the kidnapping was knowing the baby was coming. It’s a pretty horrible watch seeing her tell him she miscarried because we know he’s about to find out Phillip “died” as well. I think Blake/A-M after they divorce is a pretty great soap dynamic with two strong actors good at portraying characters whose wheels are always turning. A-M in a lot of ways is the monster of her own making. While he was definitely ambitious and out to prove something, a lot of his rush to grab power was Blake whispering in his ear and hitting all his insecurities. (She is very much her father’s daughter as played by SS.) She was the one who pushed hard to get back into his life when he wanted nothing to do with her, but then a lot of the confidence she instilled in him from successes that had a lot to do with her became arrogance. Then Blake calling immigration on Eleni led to the A-M/Eleni marriage. I liked the dynamic they set up even though it’s almost hard to watch, as Blake is scheming to break up A-M/Eleni but A-M knows full well Blake is working to prop him up because she is still in love with him. However, she’s also so closely hitched her own career prospects to him that if he cuts her loose and stops leading her on that she has nothing so there’s not much he can do to do right by her. What SS does so well is convey that she absolutely knows what is going on and it’s crushing, but she also is going to try to keep scheming until she wins just like Roger would. Until she decides an interlude to channel her pain towards hurting Holly is what she wants. I liked those scenes with A-M/Blake when they are just friends/confidantes who get each other (with some remaining sexual tension). I like those relationships like Ed/Holly being on the canvas that are always there and vaguely threatening to their respective partners, but also keeps the characters’ histories alive through their conversations.

Just how dead was Jackie? Buzz was dead on the show until 1993 haha. Phillip’s mom coming back from the dead AND being Lucy’s mom would be high drama at least. It reminds me of when they have Reva doing the police sketch of Brent as A-M and Alan dramatically watch. First, it’s sort of funny because while Reva was attacked by Frank Beaty’s Brent she remembers the face of the new actor. But then Alan and A-M spend a solid minute going back and forth saying “It couldn’t be” while Reva has no clue what they’re talking about, then them finally telling Reva the guy she drew was dead. No one in the room mentions that A-M would also have thought Reva was dead at the time she had the altercation with Brent. I really wanted Reva to say, “I should know just because you think someone’s dead doesn’t mean it’s true.”

What’s funny is I actually could see it still being a Sarah deathbed confession that she’s always known about this secret kid of Hawk’s. I actually like the Lanie Marler thought best just because Lucy and Phillip forming a familial bond that’s separate from A-M would be an interesting dynamic. It would also make Lucy Dinah’s cousin plus more organically put A-M/Blake into the same orbit to be confidantes again.

Lucy and A-M not having sex for a really long time even pre-Brent does make you feel like there were thoughts of an incest plot.

It just seemed like an interesting coincidence if they were really exploring Lucy’s parentage that Reva has an instant-sister a few months later and learns of it while still married to Buzz. Buzz grifting an older woman wouldn’t have been out of character at that point though giving Hawk a secret daughter wouldn’t have been at all unbelievable. It also has to be someone not actually on the canvas or Buzz would’ve known them. Roger having an unknown sister maybe? Maureen having had a secret child offscreen would’ve perhaps been an interesting twist especially since Matt was seemingly involved in every story at this point and pulled A-M more closely into the Bauer fold without incest. Lucy/Bridget being cousins would’ve resurrected that abandoned friendship that I liked. It’s not dramatic per se but ties Lucy to a lot of the canvas through Matt and the Lewises/Vanessa don’t like/trust A-M. Is there a viable Marler option? Lucy being related to Phillip and Ross would actually create the most drama for A-M I feel like. I know Sam’s too young and Jackie died too soon, right? Making her Annie’s sister would’ve been possible and have some dramatic possibilities at that time especially since Lucy likely didn’t learn about being so trusting post Marian/Brent haha

It really fits the history of the show if Ross was Blake’s Ed and A-M her Roger. (Granted I never watched any pre-RR Alan, but A-M always felt closer to Roger than Alan as far as his more treacherous acts/manipulations and his motivations for them.)